Jefferson Circulation Obsolescence - Updated With Top 10!

Impressive figures, and thanks for all of your work. Jeffersons really seem to be the most able to still be found in circulation.

Out of curiosity, how often do you recalculate these numbers and, as your database increases are you seeing the numbers remain stable? These numbers are interesting.

Thanks for this. Just what I was looking for!

I track my Jefferson roll searches in an Excel spreadsheet .... and this obsolescence calculations (as well as other data stuff) is done automatically by the spreadsheet every time I update it ...... which is usually every 10 rolls searched.




It's getting there .... for example ..... at 80,000 coins the 'overall' 38-59 Circulation Obsolesence was 81.5%. At 140,000 coins it is now 81.4%.




Yes ..... I track the Jefferson circulation strikes 1938 through 1959 by individual coin ... and can report on actual versus expected find rates by each coin and mint.

Sooooo ... those questions answered ..... a little more discusssion about the 'predictive' power of this tool to estimate the liklehood of finding Jefferson's in circulation today ...

The original goal I had in mind was to be able to 'predict' the expected rate at which the various Jefferson's could be found in circulation today ...... and to a large degree this tool is quite accurate at this task.

For those truly interested ..... I must digress for a minute and be sure you are clear about the 'rate statistics' I am using .....

When I speak about 'actual' find rates ..... I am referring to fact numbers proven by actually finding so many coins in so many rolls. Soooo ... if I say I find a 1954-D at a rate of 1 coin every 1,483 searched ..... those are actual rates proven by my searches.

When I speak about 'predicted' find rates ...... I am referring to the long-term average that you would eventually arrive at if you searched for a long time ...... not to be confused with a hard-and-fast interval between finds.

Let's be very clear about that ...... a coin with a 'predicted' find rate of 1 coin every 10,000 searched DOES NOT mean that it will show up on the dot every 10,000 coins ...... it means that if you searched A LOT of coins (say 1,000,000) ... then it will on average show up once every 10,000.

Soooooo ....

As an example of the predictive power of this tool ..... here are some 'predicted' versus 'actual' rates direct from my database ... I'll choose 1 coin from each 'time period':

1939-P; Predicted @ 2,481; Actual @ 2,158
1941-D; Predicted @ 5,469; Actual @ 5,696
1943-P; Predicted @ 10,624; Actual @ 11,867
1949-P; Predicted @ 3,921; Actual @ 3,849
1953-S; Predicted @ 10,268; Actual @ 12,945
1955-D; Predicted @ 2,252; Actual @ 2,967

As impressive as that may seem .... and the tool delivers comparable accuracy amongst all the Jefferson's ..... I have one true flaw in the tool that I have not yet resolved ....

It does not account for hoarding!

The underlying assumption is that all the coins minted were actually released into circulation, and then natural forces allowed to be retired over time ...... and this is not the case all the time.

The most obvious example is the 1950-D Jefferson with a mintage of 2.6 million ..... an unknown number of which were (and still are) hoarded from day 1.

My tool predicts a 50-D find rate of 1 every 70,406 coins searched ..... which as any dedicated roll searcher will tell you is ... uhhhmmm .... optimistic.

I could 'correct' that by adjusting the mintage figures to an estimate of the actual number released into circulation ..... but have no clue what that number should be.

Anyways ..... to close this off ....

Notwithstanding the 'hoarding' problem ..... the Top-10 Most Difficult Jefferson's to find today in circulation .... and their 'predicted' find rates are as follows ..... drum roll?

43-D @ 188,308
44-S @ 133,385
44-D @ 89,199
42-S @ 87,572
39-D @ 85,494
45-D @ 71,449
38-S @ 72,982
50-D @ 70,406
38-D @ 55,412
45-S @ 48,915

Should not be a surprise that the Denver War Silver populate this list ...... if CND was reading this ... at 14,000 rolls searched for him ...... I am willing to bet that he has found most likely 3 total 1943-D; for sure two and no more than four!

Finally ..... here is a fun question to answer ....

If I search a box of nickels a week, how long should it take me to complete the circulation strike set 1938 through 1959?

Well ... you gotta bag that 43-D @ 1 every 188,308 ..... so it would take you 188,308/2,000 .... which is 94 weeks (on average, remember)!

Go search some nickels!

Enjoy

David

Excellent synopsis and excellent data.So,with 53 weeks in at a box a week that leaves me 39 more weeks to complete my set,about the time I retire! Then I can do 2 boxes a week and should have my second set in a years time. Thanks for your info,it does give us all hope of finishing in this lifetime if we persevere and work hard.

This is a very interesting post,thanks for making it. A few of things come to mind:

1) If you were searching somewhere else - West coast, mid-west, Hawaii etc. do you think you would get the same results? I would guess that the pre-1960 nickels are well mixed by now, but I have no data to show it.

2) Do you think there are some atypical boxes floating around with lots of old nickels? In you read the JFK roll hunting thread, occasionally someone will find a great box of halves with lots of silver coins it it. Any chance there are old nickel boxes as well?

3) Any estimate on how many pre-Jefferson nickels are left?

John Paul: There are absolutely atypical boxes around....I had a box 3 weeks ago that had 2 rolls of oldies - 1 had a 56-p and the rest were 40's with 1 39-p in it, and another roll was nothing but 50's coins, all common.

I've always said Obsessive Compulsive Disorders are not a bad thing, as long as it doesn't interfere with basic life functions.